General Info Bulletin from DHS

["Bruhn, Mark S." <mbruhn () INDIANA EDU>]

Forwarding this below from DHS.   

I've also been told that chatter implies that certain groups have issued
a general challenge to determine is anyone can deface 6000 web sites in
6 hours, on July 4th.  That's as specific as the information is.  Most
of us remember, I'm sure, the Chinese defacements and the resulting
American retaliatory defacements, a couple of years ago.  It was easy to
recover from those, because most times the intruder just renamed and
replaced the index file with their own.  May not be so easy if it
happens again.

M.

-- 
Mark S. Bruhn, CISSP

Chief IT Security and Policy Officer
Interim Director, Research and Educational Networking Information
Sharing and Analysis Center (ren-isac () iu edu)

Office of the Vice President for Information Technology and CIO
Indiana University
812-855-0326

Incidents involving IU IT resources: it-incident () iu edu
Complaints/kudos about OVPIT/UITS services: itombuds () iu edu



 <<Picture (Metafile)>> 
Information Bulletin
July 4th General Awareness
July 1, 2003

Attention Security Managers:  As we approach the July 4th 2003 holiday,
ongoing analysis of intelligence information and assessments show no
specific, credible information identifying terrorist intentions to
conduct attacks against National Independence Day celebrations or
related venues.  Although the recent publicized threat to the oil and
gas sector cannot be corroborated, this sector continues to represent a
high value target for the terrorists. DHS will continue to coordinate
with the intelligence community throughout the holiday period and
provide immediate threat notification as warranted. 

Overview: Terrorists are opportunistic.  They exploit vulnerabilities
left exposed, choosing the time, place and method of attack according to
the weaknesses they observe or perceive.  Increasing the security of a
particular type of target makes it more difficult for terrorists to
strike successfully.  In order to protect ourselves from those who
desire to harm our nation it is important to maintain awareness by
looking for suspicious activity or "things out of place."  
Details: DHS continues to recommend the following protective measures:
maintaining heightened status of security forces, maintaining
irregularly-timed security sweeps, conducting identity checks, etc.   ID
checks conducted at security points should be considered in order to
verify the valid business need for an approaching vehicle.  Special
vigilance should be maintained for multiple vehicles arriving outside
the window of scheduled activities.  The use of random or rolling patrol
operations can be effective in signaling to terrorists that their
chances of succeeding are minimal and terrorist operations may be
disrupted and prevented.
DHS emphasizes the need to continue our vigilance in order to ensure the
security of our homeland.  Our ability to assess threats requires timely
information.  Continued reporting from State/local and private sectors
is critical in creating a national threat profile.  DHS encourages
reporting of suspicious activities during all threat levels.

Federal agencies, private citizens and companies, can call (202)
323-3205, 1-888-585-9078.  Federal agencies, private citizens, and
companies may report incidents online at
<http://www.nipc.gov/incident/cirr.htm>.  

DHS intends to update this information should it receive additional
relevant information, including information provided to it by the user
community.  Based on this notification, no change to the Homeland
Security Advisory System (HSAS) is anticipated; the current HSAS level
is "YELLOW.


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